The idea of transferring server computing platforms to the ARM architecture received a new blow. This time, the Chinese company was very unlucky. More precisely, a joint venture between the American company Qualcomm and the Chinese Huaxintong Semiconductor (HXT).
The partners formed a joint venture in 2016 to develop a server processor based on the ARMv8-A instruction set. Qualcomm held a 45% stake in the Guizhou Huaxintong Semi-Conductor Technology JV, while the provincial government and other Chinese investors held a majority stake. The joint project was based on the 10-nm 48-core Centriq 2400 processor previously developed at Qualcomm. The Chinese side, with the help of American specialists, built national encryption blocks certified in China into the processor. Otherwise, we can assume that the Chinese version of the Centriq 2400 is a processor - was almost a copy of the Qualcomm processor.
The fate of the original Centriq 2400 turned out to be . Already in the spring of 2018, Qualcomm actually overclocked its home division for the development of server processors based on the ARM architecture. But the Chinese still held out. In May 2018, at one of the industry events in China, StarDragon processors were shown for the first time, and Huaxintong in December 2018. However, with the spring, everything ended the same way as Qualcomm did with the Centriq 2400, or at least it looks like it will end very, very soon.
With reference to The Information, Reuters news agency that on Thursday at a meeting of employees of JV Guizhou Huaxintong Semi-Conductor Technology, it was announced that the company would soon be closed. To be precise, Qualcomm decided to close this project on April 30th. Meanwhile, since August 2018 alone, partners have invested $570 million in the activities of the joint venture. As a result, the Chinese will be left with the developed processor in their hands, but they are unlikely to be able to continue developing StarDragon and the corresponding platform on their own. The Qualcomm company brought the StarDragon processor to them almost on a silver platter. Without plans and the ability to independently develop the project, even on a finished and successful product, you can confidently put an end to it. He has no future.
Source: 3dnews.ru